The Opening
by Aelaer
Summary: Between his travel through over fourteen million timelines and the arrival of Thanos on Titan, Stephen Strange carefully arranges the eclectic group of people surrounding him to put them in the best position to bring their universe closer to the winning timeline. Mantis plays a big part, but all characters on Titan have a role of some sort.


On both the Doctor Strange Discord and on tumblr there were rumblings about the complete lack of stories (it was 0 when this conversation occurred) documenting meaningful interaction between Strange and Mantis (at least in AO3 tagging). This gapfiller was written to rectify this. Complete with all the chess analogies you could possibly want.

It also fills my Stephen Strange Bingo square "14,000,605", huzzah!

I believe this will be the final story for this series. After all, Endgame is just around the corner! *_squee_*

* * *

When Stephen Strange told Tony Stark that there was only one future in which they 'won', he was not telling a lie.

In his eyes, out of the over 14 million possibilities he skimmed in his passage of time, there was truly only one path that he considered something of a 'win'. Did they defeat Thanos in other timelines? Yes, of course. There is more than one way to skin a rabbit, as they say. In these alternate timelines, however, _something_ would happen and the cost for that final victory at the end of the long road the Infinity Stones wandered would always end up too high. Thanos was defeated, but the price made it as good as a loss.

(And the one future where they did 'win' was such a hefty price in itself, but it was the only way.

Should they be fortunate enough to walk the road of victory, he could only hope that those who lived through it all could one day forgive him.

He wasn't sure if he could ever forgive himself for what he knew he had to do.)

The moment Stephen Strange told the eclectic group of beings surrounding him that there was only one way to 'win', they immediately demanded answers.

"Then how do we win?" Peter Quill asked.

He exhaled. "I can't tell you." Before anyone could object, he continued, "If I tell you, I set us upon a path to a future in which we lose. I _cannot_ tell you."

That seemed to be enough for the man known as Star-Lord. Somewhere in the back of his mind he wondered how the half-human would react to how much he now _knew_.

Stark— no, Tony, it was impossible to think of him as anything else, now— was looking at him with a furrowed brow. "Is there anything you can tell us?"

Another slow exhale.

It was time to set the board.

"Thanos won't arrive for another hour and half, so there is time to rest and plan. I suggest you both," his eyes darted between Tony and Peter Quill, "start getting a plan going. Between you two, you know everyone's strengths and Thanos's capabilities." And that was about all he could say to them. The first two pieces were on the board, ready to be set.

Tony's brow remained furrowed. "And you?"

He gestured towards a spot near the Guardians' ship, the _Benatar_— which they didn't know he knew, of course. He learned the name in a handful of futures.

(It was in one, and only one, future that he learned more about the ship's name. It was one of those futures where Thanos was killed early on, but other forces heard word of his demise and came after the Stones. He was imprisoned with Peter Quill after a force of aliens that were the fanatical part of the Kree race overpowered them on their way back to Earth. They had tried to use the gauntlet, but… none of them could wield four stones. Peter had nearly died trying to do so.

The story of the ship didn't come until after a couple days of agony. Everyone but he and Peter Quill were dead at that point, and he was half-delirious with pain as they attempted to take the Time Stone from him. Peter's arm— the one that tried to wear the gauntlet— was becoming gangrenous from lack of treatment. But despite that, Stephen's only companion still tried to distract him from his own pain the next time he was dragged into their cell after a prolonged session of 'break the sorcerer to get the Stone'. They talked about his ship, and Peter admitted that it was named after the 'Terran singer' Pat Benatar. His mom had really liked her, apparently. They spent a couple hours talking about music after that. It was his last pleasant memory before he died in that timeline.)

Stephen drew himself out of his thoughts and answered Tony, "I need to consider what I have seen and determine how to best keep us upon the right path." And to set himself as the next piece on the board.

They let him be after that, and he walked to a spot that put himself about ten yards away from the others and twenty yards away from the _Benatar_'s door. He was well within sight of both. He settled upon a rock and closed his eyes as he awaited the next series of events.

Said events were not long in coming. Tony and Peter Quill's conversation was too quiet to hear from his position, but he easily heard Drax's comment concerning food on the _Benatar_ and Peter Parker's excited, "Space food!" before he lowered his voice again.

(There were a couple iterations where, as they waited for Thanos to arrive, they took time to eat the 'space food' and plan all together as one large company. Despite the seriousness of the situation, the conversation had diverged in one timeline between him and Peter Parker to discuss the food astronauts used and a crazy idea to replace all of the 'junk' on the International Space Station with the 'much better' food the Guardians used. Peter was trying to convince him that he could portal into the ISS and drop it off there.

Inane conversation and small breaks in the otherwise severe situation were fairly constant in all timelines, especially during the waiting period on Titan. It made his skim through all the different iterations more bearable.)

A moment after Peter's exclamation, Mantis left the kid and Drax to approach the ship. From the corners of Stephen's eyes he saw her looking at him in open contemplation before turning and entering the _Benatar_. He was careful and made sure to keep his gaze away from staring directly at the ship; in a couple scenarios she was intimidated by his direct stare and never approached him. It was vital she continued with her current plan.

He instead watched Peter Parker and Drax as Peter attempted to explain the mechanics and purpose of several gestures unfamiliar to the alien. This included more universal human gestures such as the high-five and thumbs up, but they had moved onto what he now knew as 'the dab'. He saw Peter Quill and Tony pause their conversation as their respective teammates performed it several times. He had a similar reaction when it started somewhere in the ten thousands, but as it happened every one thousand or so iterations, the spectacle of the sight became the norm fairly fast. (There was one iteration where the two of them arm wrestled instead, but that happened less than fifty times and required Peter Quill and Tony Stark to never make a plan together in the first place. It was not meant to be.)

There she was, now, with a pack that he knew contained several bars of some sort of food that seemed to expand in the stomach; the small snack was enough to make an empty stomach comfortably full. She also carried a bag of small pellets that expanded in the mouth, then gently broke to give enough water for a mouthful per pellet despite their size.

(In almost all iterations where these bars and pellets were brought out, Tony had mused about the possibility of reverse engineering the 'food tech'. Unfortunately the writing on the wrappers was a language unknown to all Guardians present; only Rocket knew it. He saw Rocket in less than one hundred timelines, but the modified animal managed to make an impression every single time.)

Mantis went to the others first, offering Drax and the younger Peter the food and a few pellets each before crossing towards Tony and the older Peter. Again Stephen turned his gaze slightly, affecting a look of one lost in thought even as a good part of him tracked the actions of his… well, at this point, he supposed he would call them his teammates.

(The younger Peter was enthralled by Drax's explanation of the food. The older Peter went back to discussing something about the gauntlet with Tony as he slipped the bar into a pocket and popped the water pellets one by one into his mouth. Tony nibbled on the bar and listened with a furrowed brow. Stephen was facing none of them, but he saw it as clear as day regardless.)

The next piece arrived in the form of Mantis's soft footsteps. "Excuse me," she said, and thus set herself upon the board.

Stephen lifted his head and met the alien's wide black eyes. "Yes?"

She lifted up the pack. "I have food and water pellets, if you are hungry and thirsty."

"I am," he admitted, and took the proffered items with a small, weary smile. "Thank you." He peered inside the bag and carefully knocked one of the pellets into a mostly-still palm. "Water pellets?" he asked, because it was expected of him to do so. It was a way for her to get used to him.

As Mantis explained how they worked, Stephen casually glanced at the others. Drax and younger Peter were now sitting, Peter's brow furrowed as Drax gestured widely during a story (which was definitely about the Abilisk; those gestures were entirely too familiar now). Between the other pair, Tony was now speaking, pointing upward and then bringing his hand down flat (ah, right, the opening gambit: outright flattening Thanos. If only it were so easy).

"Do you not have them on Terra?" Mantis asked. Pellet explanation over. Stephen turned his attention primarily back to her.

"Not in this specific form, for human— or, uh, person— consumption." He popped a pellet into his mouth, and truly water had never tasted so good. As he broke open the wrapper on the bar, he said, "Your name is Mantis, right?"

She offered a little smile and nodded. "Yes." Her brow then creased. "Your friend called you… Strange?"

"Doctor Strange," he clarified, and bit into the bar. It wasn't a really good sandwich from the Corner Street Grocers; hell, it wasn't even a mostly-decent sub from Bleecker's Finest Deli a couple doors down from the Sanctum, but it was more than fine.

Mantis's face brightened with joy. "I know that word! It is similar to what I am with my friends. I am much better at treating hurts than they are; most of them are too impatient or careless." Her eyes narrowed a little as she studied his face. "You have been hurt," she pointed out, gesturing to his face.

He exhaled slowly; it was more in his nature to play close to the chest with wounds that did not acquire immediate attention, especially amongst strangers, but these next steps were necessary. That did not mean Stephen was exactly looking forward to it. "We were in battle before we left Earth and I have not had the chance to tend to it." That, and he didn't want to spare energy searching the ship for the equivalent of alien bandaging before they landed. Hardly worth the effort.

But as he well knew, Mantis disagreed with his inward thoughts about the effort. "I can help," she offered. "I have a disinfectant that works with Peter— my Peter," she clarified, "though he is really Gamora's Peter." Her lips visibly twisted downward at Gamora's name, but then she lifted her eyes again and pushed away the frown with a somewhat-forced smile. "It should be fine with you. May I?"

Stephen had said 'no' in a few dozen versions of this conversation. He got no joy from the hurt that crossed her expression at his rejection (especially in his more abrasive refusals), but he really would have preferred to do this himself. This was probably one of the ways the universe was getting back at him for being an asshole most of his adult life.

He stirred himself out of his thoughts and answered Mantis with a small nod and a quiet, "Sure."

Her lips curled up into a slight smile and her eyes darted back to the pack at her side. She opened it and withdrew a cloth case, then unzipped the case and brought out what appeared to be a disinfectant wipe (but was in reality much more when paired with the small case, and something he would not mind getting his hands on). She reached out and carefully dabbed at the scratches above his right eyebrow, then wiped away the streaks of dried blood that ran down the side of his face.

The sorcerer kept his gaze downward as she worked and stared at his misshapen hands in silent expectancy. It was going to happen any moment now. He had never asked her if she had meant to do it or if she had done it without necessarily trying to do so, and now was not the time to inquire. Stephen would keep to what he saw in their winning timeline to the minute if it was within his power; his curiosity could be sated another time.

There it was. He felt her ministrations stop for a little longer than the other pauses; then, as she folded the wipe, the pads of her fingers lightly brushed against his skin for but a couple seconds.

Mantis gasped in— shock, perhaps. Maybe pain? He never asked. A detriment on his part, perhaps, but there were so many strings to keep track of, and comforting words were never his strong suit. He looked up in feigned surprise and not-quite-feigned concern (her reaction, no matter how many times he'd seen it, did not fail to make him twinge. He was not utterly heartless). She had stumbled a couple feet away and now stared at him with wide eyes.

"Mantis?" he asked, and again, the concern was not exactly feigned, even though he already knew why she had reacted the way she did. He couldn't blame her.

Before she could answer, Drax hurried on over, Peter Parker trailing behind him. He had clearly seen her stumble back, as Stephen was counting on him to. "What did you do?!" he hollered, and that drew the attention of Tony and Peter Quill, who then quickly approached the group. Now all the pieces he could direct were on the board; it was just a matter of setting them in the correct places.

Mantis placed herself in between him and Drax before the latter could do something that he would certainly regret. "He did not do anything!" she said, eyes wide as she looked up at her friend. "I was just… surprised." She turned to look at him again, her wide-eyed expression unchanging as she continued, "You are in great pain." Stephen did his best to ignore the looks he knew were upon him now. Unconsciously, he clenched his jaw and began to stare her down before she could so much as think about pitying him.

He really could do without this sort of attention. The universe was definitely having a laugh at him.

Thankfully, the moment did not last long, and he was brought back to the purpose of all this when Tony asked, "Wait— what?"

Mantis drew her gaze away from him and Stephen forced himself to relax. She told Tony, "I am an empath, so I can feel someone's emotions. But I can also feel someone's pain."

Stephen was not entirely sure if Tony was aware of the half-step he took backwards at her proclamation; it remained unnoticed by the rest of the group, because Peter Quill immediately chimed in with, "Yeah, and she can also wake unconscious people and put Celestials to sleep— oh! _Oh_!" He snapped his fingers and pointed at Mantis. "That's brilliant! I'm brilliant."

The sorcerer relaxed more as Peter Quill put himself in the right square upon the board, and waited for the rest to fall into place.

"You are not brilliant," Drax said.

"Shut up; you haven't even heard my brilliant plan yet," Peter retorted. He narrowed his eyes at Mantis. "You just need to grab Thanos's head. Maybe we can knock him down…"

Peter Parker was looking at the older Peter in confusion, but Tony had caught on just as Drax was speaking and now looked between Quill and Mantis thoughtfully. At the former's verbal musings, the billionaire's eyes swung about to meet Stephen's gaze. "What about a portal?"

"A portal?" Quill asked.

Stephen spoke for the first time since they congregated about him. "If you can hold him down in one place, I can form a portal above his head for her to jump down."

Peter Parker mouthed 'portal' in clear awe as Peter Quill snapped his fingers again and pointed at the sorcerer. "Yes," he said, then turned to Mantis, who stared at him with wide eyes. "If you can put a Celestial to sleep, how bad can a Titan be?"

Her eyes widened further for a moment, but then her expression calmed and she lifted her chin a little. "I can try."

"You can do it," Peter answered cheerfully, then turned back to Tony. "All we need to do is get him immobile."

From there, the conversation turned purely strategic; that he had seen versions of this scene millions of times allowed him to sink into his own thoughts. In one part of his mind, he heard as Tony insisted on trying to crush Thanos first and as the discussion moved to the various powers and tools they had between all of them for restraining the Titan ("The crimson bands of _what_?"). He appeared alert as they decided it would be best if Stephen was the only one seen when Thanos first arrived ("Yeah, I'll move the _Benatar_ a mile or two away and fly right over.") and as they determined who should try to get the gauntlet off ("I can pull several times my weight with this suit.").

The majority of his mind, however, was set upon the consequences of this winning strategy. He truly wished he could tell Peter and the other Guardians about Gamora. He wished he could stop Tony from being stabbed. He wished that he could keep his word to him concerning the kid's life.

But if all went the way it should, Peter Parker would live again; but Tony's presence among the living was vital for Peter— and all others across the wide universe— to come back.

He was thankful for the lesson the Ancient One had imparted upon him before her death; it would have been a greater blow to the man he was two years ago to know how little he meant in winning this war, despite being the keeper of the Time Stone. Certainly he had a part; to deny that would be completely falsifying his role in all this. But had he not learned her lesson, he surely would have been stubborn enough to attempt to find a way that allowed him to control as much of the outcome as possible through his own actions as opposed to relying on the intelligence and instincts of others. It was quite possible that the Stephen Strange of two years ago, with the sort of power he had now, would have simply gone for the timeline that gave him the most ability to control the outcome; that Stephen Strange would consider what sacrifices came from that choice as necessary evils so that he could personally prevent a worse outcome.

It was a sobering thought.

Eventually the conversation dwindled as the strategy was set. Peter Quill took Mantis's pack, then set off towards the _Benatar_ to park her further away from the spot where Thanos would portal in, well out of sight. The rest of them drew away from the spaceship to give it room; Tony placed an arm around his protege and steered him away for a quiet conversation while Drax spoke not-as-quietly with Mantis. Stephen took this time to withdraw from the group and mentally prepare himself further for what he knew he had to allow to happen.

Before he could retreat entirely, a soft, but insistent, "Doctor Strange!" paused him in his tracks. He turned to see Mantis hurrying towards him, a resolved look set upon her face.

Oh. Right.

She stepped up to him and said, "You have many things to concentrate on in this battle."

He inclined his head in acknowledgement. "I do."

"Your pain will not help you there."

Stephen pursed his lips together. _Even though_ the ending of this conversation was inevitable, he still answered, "My pain is a constant. I am well used to it."

Mantis shook her head. "Not all of it. I felt all the types within you now. You have a constant ache in your hands—" She reached out with one hand towards his and he instinctively drew back. She paused, then let her hand fall. "That you are used to. You also have a stabbing pain in your temple that you have been trying to ignore."

He could not help himself and retorted, "Trying to ignore? You are a mind-reader as well?"

"No," she answered. "You have the same look on your face that the others do when they try to push pain away."

Stephen fell silent. He really had no excuse for his rebuke; he _knew_ she was going to say something of the like. Still, thinking of the Maw made him… ornery. And while the pain from the needles had dulled down to something bearable, it was still _there_ and it was, in a word, annoying.

She watched him for a moment longer, then said, "I think the pain you carry upon your spirit is even greater, but I do not think you will allow me to relieve your ache there. You were very fast to block me before." Had he? He did not realize that, but it was no surprise his defenses were high. "I can help relieve your physical pain, though."

He knew she could. Her ability to manipulate neurotransmitters was both exhilarating and terrifying. That type of power could be devastating with the wrong person. It was a blessing to their universe that Mantis was as kind-hearted as she was.

"It will not hurt you?" he asked, and watched her carefully. She shook her head, and he still couldn't tell if she was lying or not. It _seemed_ truthful, but some of her expressions in other timelines during the process…

Inwardly Stephen sighed. He needed to be at the top of his game and a temporary relief to the pain could end up being what was needed. He had not followed a timeline where he refused her offer and he was not willing to experiment now. "If it will not harm you, then… I suppose you may."

She offered him a smile, then reached again for his hand; this time he did not pull away. Her head tilted to the side as she studied the scars upon his fingers, but to his relief she did not ask questions and instead cupped his hand gently in between both of her own. Her eyes fluttered shut as the flagella on both antennae lit up.

He almost immediately started to feel a difference. It seemed as if the pain in his head was being drained away, and the process only took a few seconds before both the headache and consistent ache in his cheeks were gone. Stephen exhaled softly in relief, then began to move back.

However, Mantis increased her grip upon his hand; it was not enough to hurt him, but enough to stop him in his tracks. His brow furrowed; _this_ was different. "Mantis—"

She kept her eyes shut and ducked her head down, then suddenly he felt the ache within his hands begin to dissipate into something softer and more bearable, as if he had soaked them in a lukewarm bath of Epsom salts. "Mantis…"

Her flagella dimmed and retracted to their former size, and only then did she open her eyes to look at him. "You suffer, though you do not allow anyone to see. You will not allow me to help your spirit, so I am left to help your body as best as I can."

Stephen blinked and stared at her as she withdrew her hands from him; he found himself at a rare loss for words. When he found his voice again, he said, "Thank you."

Mantis smiled once more and left him to his silent musings.

Eventually Peter Quill returned, flying in from the south (or what he presumed was south; it was difficult to tell) and with his arrival there was less than twenty minutes until Thanos arrived. Both he and Tony started directing people to get into their places for the planned ambush, and Stephen rose to position himself within thirty feet of the expected arrival spot.

The board was set and the pieces were moving.

And if they were lucky, they would be the ones to eventually say 'checkmate'.

* * *

The name "endgame" refers to a specific stage of chess. With such a title for the film that is certainly going to tear all our hearts to pieces, I had to throw in the LOTR chess quote and pay homage to my home fandom. And yeah, the fic title is a chess term as well, referring to the beginning of the game.

To my knowledge there is no official time given between Strange going through timelines and Thanos's arrival on Titan. So I gave them a big chunk of time to work with for mainly story purposes (it was probably shorter but nothing in canon that I know of says 100% otherwise, so nwuah).

Scene partially inspired by the fact that between Strange's Time Stone Adventure and Thanos, his wounds look a bit less bloody and partially cleaned. And I totally think Mantis would be the one to notice that he's hurt in the first place. So wooooo poor sorcerer gets some comfort. Before he's dusted.

Corner Street Grocers and Bleecker's Finest Deli are both real places that I passed in Greenwich Village when I visited NYC a couple weeks ago; the deli is in the corner of where the Sanctum would be, right beside a tattoo parlour. I didn't get a chance to eat at either location, but Strange's thoughts are basically reflections of their average rating on Google. The deli is a bit less pricey, too.

The food bars (dubbed internally as 'space lembas') and water pellets are completely made up, but some society somewhere in Marvel-land probably has something like that.

I researched how emotion scientifically works and, to my delight, I found that neurotransmitters are part of the mechanisms for sending chemical signals to the brain for emotions, pain, and inducing sleep. I believe that Mantis can manipulate both excitatory and inhibitory neurotransmitter receptors and (somehow) take the chemicals released from one person to herself as needed (though as we have seen with her ability to induce sleep, she does not seem to take on the chemicals released in this process, or at least not to a point that is completely detrimental to herself that it causes heavy drowsiness).

Comments are, as always, greatly appreciated.


End file.
